Innocents Beyond Belief
by Ski000Girl
Summary: One doesn't forget their first kiss. That moment and that person will forever be ingrained in your memory. That is, as long as you can remember who they were. For Lily, this isn't so easy, and contrary to popular belief, James Potter was not her first.
1. Before

A/n So school's started up again, and while that means I have less time than ever on my hands, it also means I'll be reintegrating Fanfiction back into my life to try and keep me at least partially sane for the next 8 months. I know everybody would rather see me post the next chapter to Knowledge & Power, something I promise I will do soon, but I just wanted to do this because firstly I stumbled across some old notebooks that I had a brief summary for some new story ideas that I didn't know I had come up with which is always an exciting find, and secondly because I just wanted to get back into the flow of writing again with something minor (that ironically turned out to actually be huge at least by one-shot standards and take up a lot of my time).

This was originally intended to be a quick one-shot. As you can see, I got a little carried away. Thus the divisions in odd places. I tried to make it as seamless a cut off as I could, but it's actually something that's quite difficult to do after the fact, breaking up into chapters that is. Also because of this, the action doesn't really happen until the next chapter so stay tuned. I should have it up in the next couple of days after I finish some editing on it. I hope you all enjoy this nevertheless.

xxx

_One doesn't forget their first kiss. Somebody important-I think-once said that but I can't remember exactly who. It doesn't matter if you are 11 or 21, that moment and that person will be permanently ingrained into your memory. That is, as long as you can remember who they were. For Lily Evans, my best girlfriend in the world, well she might have to blush and admit that she really doesn't even know the last name of the first boy she kissed. Nevertheless, that doesn't mean she's going to forget the encounter. Unless of course, the drinks that she had been pounding back earlier in the night had any effect on her mental capacity._

_Contrary to popular beliefs, Lily Evan's first kiss was no in fact with the person that everybody thought it had been. Her first kiss was with some guy named James, but no, James Potter had been no where in the vicinity when his dream girl had found herself lock lipped with a boy for the first time. Now, are you confused yet? How do I know all this you may ask, well the answer is very simple? For I was sitting across from her in the dark club as the events of the evening rapidly began to unfolded. _

_Your first question is probably nothing about who I am, and rightfully so. You just want to hear the story of our good-girl gone bad, but I feel like I owe you all first an explanation. Or better yet, a disclaimer, for I am not who you may think of me to be. Lily and I go way back. We attended nursery school together when we were just wee. Then the wonders of primary school awaited us. We never got to move onto our next adventure together however, because one day Lily's family decided to send her off to some far off place to Boarding School. I never understood why, and nobody ever bothered to fill me in on the reasoning behind this decision, but oh well. Lily and I make up for lost time in the summer months, and that was exactly what we were doing on the night we stumbled into our next adventure as life-long friends._

_The second part of my disclaimer consists of me admitting that at this time, I wasn't away that anybody by the name of James Potter actually excited on this great island we call home. Maybe it was naive of me to believe that Lily and I could just pick up our friendship like no time had passed, but that's what I had hoped for, and always believed to be happening._

_Currently I am only one of few who know of the wilder side of the good natured, rule abiding, red-head that we all know and love, but I would like that to change. So let me take you on a journey, back to a night where memories were made…_

Lily was standing in front of the floor length mirror that had been affixed to the back of the door. Intently she was studying herself. Inch by inch, as if looking for flaws. The only ones that could be found however, were those of her own mind playing tricks on her, for she did look stunning. Not a hair out of place, except those that were intentionally left to flutter off in a random direction.

The black skirt she had on would have made her father curse in disgust, for it lacked the inches and bulk that would have made a father of a teenage daughter able to sleep soundly at night. Her top was also cut far to low for her to attend church in. Thankfully that was not what she was about to do though. It was Friday night, and not Sunday morning. Sins could be recounted on Sunday, and after the way the weekend was shaping up, the sins would be plentiful.

"I wish I had better shoes to wear than these," Lily huffed, as she unwillingly placed her feet into a pair of flats. While heels would have made her outfit look all the better, her feet would be thanking her at the end of the night that they had been placed in a more forgiving pair of shoes.

Lily's face was all natural. She had forgone the look of heavy make-up that so many of the teens of the day were into. Instead she had placed her trust in her own beauty to make her stand out. Much unlike her muggle friend who was currently in the bathroom, huddled over the sink, rapidly applying heavy layers of lipstick and eye makeup.

The clock was ticking, the two friends had arranged to meet up with a group of people at one of the guy's houses, before going downtown. If they didn't leave shortly they would surely be late.

After a few disagreements about which colour shirt was better and necklace or no necklace, the girls were out the door. It was the last weekend of summer and so dusk had fallen much earlier than everyone was used to, and bringing with it the chill of fall.

Lily pulled her light cover up tighter around her shoulders. She knew that when she got to where they were going she would be pleased to not have a bulky jumper to lug around, but currently she was regretting it.

Luckily the walk to where they were meeting everyone wasn't too far away. Just a couple of blocks.

The people they were meeting were new friends of Melinda, Lily's friend. Lily had never met any of them before, but according to Melinda, they were very nice people and a lot of fun. Lily wasn't so sure about the a lot of fun part. Usually she associated that descriptive word with the partier's of Hogwarts, but she was trying to keep an open mind in regard to the evening. She had never gone out like this with friends, with the main goal being at the end of the night to see how much you had drank. Lily wasn't all that sure about it, but she'd vowed to give it a shot. You never knew what could come out of it after all. At least she'd have Melinda with her. While Melinda was more easy going and willing to let loose, she still had that little voice in the back off her mind that was telling her that bad things could happen to girls that let themselves party to hard. Therefore, before leaving Melinda's place, both girls had agreed that if ever either of them wanted to leave, they would both do so together.

Where they were meeting up with the rest of their entourage was at a flat in a rather large apartment complex. The two girls stood awkwardly in the lobby as they waited for the lift to come and retrieve them. It was an odd feeling for Lily to be standing waiting for a machine to come, when the stairs were just right beside them, but Lily kept her thoughts to herself. Only in the wizarding world was it common place to have students hike from the dungeons to the tallest tower, with the only assistance being their own two feet.

After the lift had deposited them on the proper floor Lily voiced one of the thoughts that had been rolling around in her head, "Will their parent's be home?"

It wasn't a stupid question, but the look that Melinda shot back towards Lily made her seriously question her judgment.

"Of course not, they don't live with their parents any longer."

Momentarily confused, Lily tried to piece it all together. Either Melinda's new best buds were teenage run-aways, also known as the bad kids, or they were much older. Turns out the latter was the true answer. It appeared that Lily knew less about her friend than she thought, but she just kept repeating her mantra over and over again in her mind to just go with it, for once. She couldn't help but wonder though, where Melinda had met these people at.

The flat that the girls entered into was not overly generous in terms of space, but what it lacked for in square footage it surely made up for with the view. Or what surely must be an awesome view when it was daytime. They living area was in the far corner of the apartment and two of the walls were straight windows. It must become unbearably stuffy in their during the heat of the summer, when the sun bore down on the room for hours upon hours creating a makeshift greenhouse.

After noting the basic layout of the place, the next thing that caught Lily's attention was the people that were sprawled out on the armchairs and sofa in the small seating area. Sitting cuddled up in one of the chairs was a couple that introduced themselves with a grin, but Lily quickly forgot their names as soon as she was bombarded by an onslaught of names by everyone else in the near vicinity.

It took her a moment, but finally Lily gathered her wits about her and smiled and proceeded to relax just a little bit. Melinda slipped off into one of the bedrooms and Lily quickly followed in her footsteps. She was still a little bit too shy to be left alone in that sea of new people.

Off the kitchen in the room that Melinda had disappeared into a guy was placing shirts out on his bed.

"Which one should I wear?" he sheepishly asked the two girls.

Lily fought back a chuckle. It was painfully obvious that he wasn't comfortable with this whole scene either, so that made Lily feel a little bit more at ease.

As the next ten minutes or so passed by, Lily came to realize that she was not the only one who was not familiar with the whole going out scene. Even though the friends of Melinda's had upon first glance appeared to be very confident, it was becoming increasingly apparent that they were all more of the studious type, just like Lily, who wanted to say that they had gone out to experience the city's night life at least once in their life.

Upon further conversations with those around her Lily was informed that yes they were indeed older, but some not by much. Some of them, such as the couple sitting in the armchair were finishing up their last year of school and then next year they'd be moving onto University. The group of guys whose flat they were currently standing in were just about to begin their second year of university. So Lily began to feel right at home. Or at least as much as she could feel in a world that she really hadn't permanently resided in for about five years.

While everyone at first had appeared to be pretty sober, despite the littering of bottles on the kitchen table, the next person to enter the room was well on his way to not remembering the events of his night.

"Hey I'm Ty, short for Tyler you know, but you can call me either, I don't really mind," his shirt was slightly unbuttoned at the top and his hair was kind of scruffy, but overall he didn't look to bad.

Even despite the fact that he was obviously already drunk, or at least tipsy, Lily couldn't help but have a little tingling of desire. Not many people knew this about her, only her best friends at Hogwarts had recently found this out, but Lily had never been kissed before. That was probably the main reason why she had relented to Melinda's badgering about going out, because deep down she wanted her first kiss. All of the girls in her dorm had had multiple kisses and several had even moved onto multiple boyfriends. Lily however had not experienced anything like that and it was driving her absolutely mental. It always seemed to be in the back of her mind that maybe she'd be the person to die, having never had an intimate moment with a boy.

Ironically at this point, Lily was not looking for an intimate moment. All she really wanted to do was to get her first kiss out of the way and so when she actually found somebody special-if in fact she ever did-her first kiss with him would not be uncomfortable and awkward. Most people would say that was not the proper way to go about doing things. They'd say that if the guy really cared about you it wouldn't matter how inexperienced you were, but Lily knew that not to be true. Or at least that's what she had made herself believe. She fully stood by her decision that it would be better to kiss a stranger that you had no connection with and could walk away, without hearing about how bad a kisser you were, or worse. It was better to detach yourself first rather than suffer disappointment.

So that was pretty much the reason why Lily was tagging along in a nutshell, because what better place to snag a random guy than at a pub? But as Lily stood back and observed Ty, she began to think that maybe something might just happen if she worked it a little. The problem with that idea though was that she really didn't know how to work it, that was how inexperienced she was.

Before she knew it everybody was gathered around the table and Ty was pouring shots with an easy hand that only a few drinks could give a person. He spun around and noticed Lily leaned up against the wall and grinned, "Can I get you a drink?"

She shook her head in response and thankfully he didn't pressure her. It was something Lily instantly liked about this group. They accepted no as an answer. Back at Hogwarts, after a successful Quidditch game, or something of the like, people would literally try to pin you down and pour a drink down your throat even if you didn't want it. This gesture made Lily appreciate that maybe she really wasn't in for as much trouble as she had originally thought the evening would entail.

The reason she had turned down the drink in the first place was not due to her not wishing to drink at all. She was going to drink, once they got to where they were going, but in moderation. If there was one thing Lily liked to know, was that she would be able to find her way home if something bad should arise, or even just make it off the streets and to bed safely after a good night. These thoughts were especially prevalent due to the fact that this was the first time Lily had gone out to party. Everything that she had done up until that point had just been in the Gryffindor Common Room, and well if you passed out at the bottom of the stairs, you might wake up with some funny scribbling on your face and a sore neck, but you wouldn't find yourself soaking wet in a gutter, or worse.

After everyone finished their shot and a few of the girls stopped moaning about how much it burned, Ty turned on Lily again. Obviously having forgotten that he had just offered her a drink that she declined, he did so again, "What can I get you? A shot or there's always water if you're not drinking."

Lily grinned this time in response. He definitely was cute and very considerate actually, "No thanks," she chuckled, "but I appreciate how good a host you are being."

What came out of his mouth next temporarily shocked LIly.

"Oh no, this isn't my place but I still want to make sure everyone's taken care of," he said this has he sauntered over to stand beside her. All the while a goofy grin was plastered across his face.

She didn't know whether to laugh that he felt so at home at somebody else's place or be shocked that a guy was responsible enough to understand what the term good host meant at all. Nevertheless, it was definitely a turning point for Lily, because from that point on she felt right at home with this group of new friends.

Yes, the people that she was surrounded by were quite a bit older than she was, and they were also only muggles, but there was something special about them. Maybe it was the way that they welcomed a complete stranger into their midst, just like she was one of their own. It sure made Lily believe that there was still good people out there hiding in the world. While Lily loved her friends to pieces back at Hogwarts, there always seemed to be something missing in their friendship on random days of the week. Sure Lily was not a party girl, but her friends at school had never eased her gently into it, like this group was doing. At the castle it was either go big or go home when you were partying and that always made Lily uncomfortable. What was unfolding currently around her was quite the opposite. She was no longer nervous to go out, and on the contrary she was looking forward to getting downtown as soon as possible.

Before she knew it the group was gathering up their belongings and heading towards the door. The guy that had earlier required their assistance in picking out his shirt was counting heads as they made their way out of the building and down the block.

"Does everyone have their money for the buses and anything else that may come in useful for the night," he was calling out over the excited chatter of their mob.

Melinda leaned over to Lily and quietly said, "Ahh Danny is such a worrier. This is not really his scene, but he agreed to come along and you can just see that he's going to be doing head counts all night to ensure everybody is safe and accounted for."

Lily nodded to show her understanding, but the whole while she kept repeating the name Danny over and over again in her mind. That was two names that she could link to faces now. Ty, the cute one and Danny the one doing head counts. Oddly enough, Lily was finding similarities between these people and the people she knew back at Hogwarts. Danny was definitely exactly like Remus, and for better or for worse Ty was reminding her of Sirius Black. It was rather unfortunate that Lily made the latter connection in her mind, because suddenly Ty did not seem as attractive as he originally had.

"So where are we off to exactly," Lily turned to one of the few girls of the group who was walking beside her.

"Oh I don't exactly know," she giggled, apparently she too was a few drinks into her evening, "but I'm sure Danny could tell you. He's got this whole evening planned out down to the ten minute intervals. He'll probably show you our schedule if you ask him. He's keeping it in his pants pocket…" her sentence trailed off and so did she as she suddenly slowed her pace and fell to the back of the group.

Danny was currently occupied and so Lily decided her need for information wasn't that important. They'd end up where they ended up and there wasn't much she could do to change that. After all she was not a frequent flyer in the muggle world and so she really was unaware of what was currently the hip thing to do on a Friday night on the town. That being said, nobody probably would have agreed to go with her suggestions because they mostly entailed going for a butterbeer, which sadly did not exist in the muggle corner of the world.

They walked for nearly ten minutes, winding through the streets of the neighbourhoods that Lily used to be incredibly familiar with. She had grown up playing hide and seek in the park off to their right, and had learned to ride her bike just a couple blocks away in a quite, paved alley. It sure did bring back memories whenever she returned to this area.

Eventually they reached the correct bus stop and amazingly enough the bus pulled up just as they arrived. They couldn't have planned for better timing. Everybody piled onto the bus and made their way to the back, for it was still quite empty. This would only last for a few more stops, before suddenly the bus was standing room only and rocking from the boisterous cheers of the group of University students that had just boarded.

"Ah, it's the first weekend where everybody's back together. It's been months since people have seen everybody so we're guaranteed to have a good night. Especially when you factor in that for the summer months everyone moves back in with their parents. Now it's time for the freedom to finally resume," Ty laughed from his seat that was two seats away from Lily's. Melinda sat between the two of them.

For the next half an hour or so, the bus travelled along, picking up and depositing passengers at their desired stops. Lily's ears were already ringing from all the noise, as the group of guys suddenly started to sing at the top of their lungs. It was an interesting display to say the least, and it partially reminded Lily of the last years Quidditch Finals that took place between Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff. It had been a disappointing year for Gryffindor Quidditch, and one that would definitely not be spoken of again. Nevertheless, the student population had all gathered to cheer on their favourite or next favourite teams, and the stands were filled with joyful cheers, chants and song. None of it was fuelled by alcohol however, while that was mainly what the passengers of the bus were running on at the moment.

Throughout the better part of the bus ride, Melinda sat in deep conversation with Ty. They laughed and joked and pretty much excluded Lily from the conversation, not that she really minded. She wasn't feeling all that up to making conversation due to the fact that a sudden wave of exhaustion had suddenly overcome her. She had been up earlier, very early actually. Her parents and her had caught one of the first trains into London so they could get into Diagon Alley to buy Lily's next set of required books, and a few extras that were not required or even optional reading. They'd finished their shopping by lunch time, had a bite to eat and then started out on their return journey home. It was the four hours spend sitting on a train to complete the round trip that really made Lily envious of those families that were hooked up to the Floo Network or could simply apparate.

They had pretty much just made it home in time for Lily to throw some items in an overnight bag and head off to Melinda's house for their annual end of summer sleepover. Their traditional celebration had taken a turn however this year. No longer did the night consist of popcorn and an endless stack of the newest blockbusters. It had taken on a much more adult form of entertainment.

Lily stifled a yawn. If she didn't get off the bus soon, she'd probably fall asleep, and wouldn't that just be another sad story in her life for people to laugh at. So to keep herself from drifting off, Lily tried to focus her attention on what Melinda and Ty were discussing. The problem was, she could only hear every second word because of the noise level in the cramped space. From what she could make out however, Melinda and Ty were doing just fine. Better than fine actually, or so it appeared. They seemed so at ease with each other that their interactions suddenly caused something to click in Lily's now overly tired brain.

Melinda had said as they were getting ready that she had been asked out by a couple of guys that she really had a lot in common with. At a separate point in time, Melinda had also said to Lily that this group of new friends were really easy to feel like you fit in simply because she had so much in common with them. Unfortunately Lily's heart sank. She's pieced two and two together, and it was becoming apparent that there was no way she could be searching for an intimate moment tonight with Ty, if he indeed was the guy that Melinda had been talking about.

Before Lily really had a chance to process what she had just concluded, the bus pulled up to a stop and Danny jumped up. This caused a domino effect and before anybody had a chance to say anything more, they were standing out on the sidewalk in silence. Apparently the group of party boys were going onto the next stop, which as everyone began to look around, they realized it was probably the proper stop that they should have got off at. Oh well, a walk had never killed anyone.

Because nobody could manage to walk at the same pace, Lily and Melinda soon found themselves slightly separated from the rest of their entourage. It was the perfect opportunity for Lily to ask Melinda a question.

"So, you were saying earlier about going out on a couple of dates with some new guys?"

"Ah-hmm," Melinda acknowledged that she was listening, without actually showing that she was truly hearing what her friend was saying.

Lily trudged on regardless of Melinda's lack of enthusiasm. It was odd, because if Lily was pressed for details about being asked out on a date, never mind two, she would surely find herself bouncing up and down in her seat with excitement. But that was the main difference between Melinda and Lily. Melinda got asked out all the time, whereas Lily had only ever been on one date, maybe two, but she wasn't quite sure if she should actually call it a date at all. Needless to say, it was almost easier for Lily to just simply say she had no history with guys.

"I'm just wondering, if either of the guys were here tonight?"

Melinda turned to Lily and proved that she had indeed been listening by reply, "No, they aren't. Why do you ask?"

"Oh, well," Lily didn't quite know what to say. She couldn't exactly say that she was just checking in case Ty made a move on her that she was allowed to respond to him without going into the dangerous area of causing a fight with her friend, "I was just thinking that you and Ty looked like you had a connection back there. I would have thought he was the one you were going to go out with."

"No, it wasn't him who asked me," she replied quietly.

"I think it may be coming soon though," Lily added, although she mentally kicked herself afterwards. That was definitely not what she wanted to happen. She didn't want him to be interested in Melinda. Lily wanted for once a guy to look at her and another girl and decide to approach herself. It had yet to happen in Lily's life. Why had she said to Melinda what she had just found herself saying? Was it simply to make sure that Melinda had no feelings for him, because surely she could be into him, without him having asked her out. It was all just so stressful this business with relationships and even flings for that matter. As much as Lily yearned to be a part of something, maybe she truly was just better off with only herself to take care of.

It turned out that although they had got off the bus at the wrong stop, they weren't too many blocks away from where they had hoped to be. In all, the walk took a grand total of two minutes. Two and a half if you were wanting to be precise, but who really cared. Basically it only allowed for Lily and Melinda's quick conversation before they rounded the corner onto the bustling, well lit street.

To Lily, it was like she'd stepped into another world. Something she was actually all to familiar with doing. It had been years since she had been down this part of town, but that had been in the day. By the light of day, this area had appeared to be run down and dirty, and not exactly a place you wanted to spend much time around. At night however, music was pounding out of the open doors of pubs and clubs and every building was lit up by some colour scheme of neon lights. While it was still relatively early, at least by partying standards, the street was already quite busy. Ironically however, even though the street was closed to traffic, nobody was walking down the road. Instead they were sticking to the sidewalks. It was an interesting phenomenon to see, and Lily figured at some point some person had to have done a study on the things that were ingrained into people's minds.

Just to shake things up a little, the people who were leading the group decided to step off the sidewalk and move onto the empty street. As everyone walked and looked around in wonder, Lily noticed a group of girls all dressed up in costumes. One of the guys who was walking beside Lily also noticed them as well.

"Look at that," he remarked, his confusion was clearly etched onto his face, "why would they dress up like that?"

It was at that point that Lily saw the white material hanging from the back of one of the girls heads. It was a makeshift veil of sorts.

"It's a bachelorette party," Lily explained to the confused yet still curious guy, who finally nodded in understanding.

As they made it to the other side of the street, Lily noticed the blinking sign off the place that was their final destination. She had heard some of the guys talking about it as they had walked to the bus stop, and there it was.

The sign said _The Palace_, in elegant script, and while the name sounded tacky it fit in well with the places around it which were named _Bling _and _Sun Set._

Something was thrust into Lily's hand without her realizing what was going on, and when she looked down, she saw a tiny ticket stub that had _Free Entry_ written across it. Of course, she had forgotten, if they were going to a club you had to pay to get in. Luckily enough for everyone, the guys that had organized the outing had been stocking up on free admission passes and they were handing them out for their friends and friends of friends.

The other benefit to the Free Entry Tickets were that they also received VIP treatment, or at least while waiting to get in they did. This consisted of not having to wait in the line that was beginning to grow, and well that was pretty much it. It didn't spare them from having to be frisked by a large man standing at the door, nor having him look through their purses. A lump instantly formed in Lily's throat when she saw the guys in front of her being frisked. Luckily enough for her, when it got to be her turn, the fact that she was wearing extremely tight clothes was enough for the bouncer to be sure that she was not packing anything into the building that she shouldn't be.

The funny part about it was, when he opened her purse to look in it, he only looked in one side. On the back side of the bag, was a zipper that accessed the other half of the purse. She could have easily snuck something in, in that pocket and that made her a little uneasy. She mentioned this to Melinda who just shrugged her shoulders and said, "I guess he just didn't see it."

Why bother searching things then, Lily thought, if you aren't going to do it thoroughly?

As soon as they pushed their way through the double glass doors, the lights that were once so bright out on the strip, instantly dimmed. Instead of the multi-colourness of outside, the inside was dark with a subtle blue tinge. Lily saw the guys who had gone in before them, leaning up against the wall and so she walked over to stand with them. Melinda was the last of the group to arrive and so when she finally made it to their assembling station, they all set off again. To their right was a tight spiral staircase that wound its way up to a second floor. Half of the group split off and embarked on a different adventure, to the upstairs region. The rest of them continued to walk into the heart of the club. On the far wall was a stage that was surrounded by speakers. The centre of the room was just empty space, that later in the night would be utilized as a dance floor. Currently however, the area was deserted. The only people that were there already were leaning up against the bar or the few surrounding tables. The bar was back-lit by a wall of blue glass with lights behind it, and all the bottles were situated on shelves attached to the glass.

Without realizing what she was doing, Lily did a complete 360 turn. Once she made it all the way around, she realized what she had just done, and blushed in embarrassment. She'd done exactly what she had been trying all night not to do, which was seem like an inexperienced child. What she had noticed during her rotation that she had initially missed upon her first scan of the room was the closed off area that was to her far left. It was a few steps up from the dance floor and was lit up differently then the rest of the place. There were a few tables on the one side of this VIP area, and the rest of the area consisted of couches and lounges that were separated by long, billowing, lacy drapes for privacy. At the entrance area was a miniature bar, with a single bartender preparing the glassware for the later crowds. Lily wondered how much extra it costed to be allowed access to that privileged area.

Without realizing what was happening around her, Lily had missed that the rest of her group had made their way already across the empty dance floor. They were currently disappearing up a staircase that was at the back of the building on the exact opposite end from where they had entered. With a final quick glance around, Lily hurried off after them. She caught up with them at the top of the staircase, which opened up into a balcony area that overlooked the dance floor. Just as the bar was set up below, there was the exact same set up on the upper floor as well. Down to the blue glass and everything. What differed there from downstairs however was that right at the top of the stairs were two couches set up to face each other with a long, low coffee table in between them. This area too was surrounded by mesh draperies.

As Lily walked by the little seating area she had this instant pang of realization that that area was set up in the dark part of the club so people could have a place to go and snog.

What she couldn't see when she looked around the balcony area, was the other half of their group. They must have come up the staircase at the other end, and then retreated back down right away.

Realizing that nothing much was happening at the club yet, the five people that made up Lily's group headed back downstairs. They met up with the others out by the door. One of the guys that Lily had not been formally introduced to yelled over the music, "there's a pretty decent pub just a few doors down. We're going to go and get some drinks there and then head back this way? You guys coming?"

Everyone agreed that that was probably a good idea, and probably the idea that everyone else who was out partying for the night had had. So, they pushed through the doors and found themselves once again out on the brightly lit street. Again Lily found her stomach give a little flutter. She couldn't believe she was really doing this. She'd just been inside a club and now she was heading off to a bar for drinks with some friends. It was so totally unlike her, but amazingly enough she was enjoying herself immensely already, even though just little things had been occurring. It was more the expectation of what was to come that was fuelling her excitement. She hoped it wouldn't be a let down, but for awhile it would appear that it was going to go that way. That is, until everything took a turn for the shall we say, more eventful.

xxx

a/n So what did you guys think so far? Yeah I know this was a build up with no big events occurring but stay tuned for the more "interesting" events and as always, please let me know what you think. Thanks!


	2. During

The guy had been right, the pub wasn't to far away. They crossed the street and walked by one of the more popular clubs that Lily had heard people talk about in passing when she was out in the muggle city. The pub actually turned out to be right beside that club.

At the door, a girl that worked their came out to meet them and see how many seats they would need. She quickly shook her head when she saw how large a group they were, but instead of having a chance to turn them away which she was about to do, somebody piped up that they wouldn't mind being separated into two smaller groups if need be. This solved the girls problem and she escorted them into a couple of large booths that were side by side. She passed out menus as it was not just a pub but a restaurant and then she was on her way. Lily and Melinda had found themselves sitting together which was intentional and to Lily's right was Danny. Two more guys sat beyond him that Lily figured she was finally going to get introduced to, and one other guy sat to Melinda's left. Overall it looked like they had a pretty good group.

Before anybody really had a chance to look at the menus the waitress had reappeared. She was a very bubbly individual and so instead of walking over, the more accurate way of describing her movements would have been to say that she had bounced over to their table.

"What can I start you guys off with?"

Lily quickly glimpsed at the long menu of unhealthy pub style food and cringed. It all sounded incredibly good, but she was not all that hungry, and to top it off, she had a budget for the night. She knew she wanted to drink, and that buying drinks out was expensive so she decided to forgo the food. She had eaten an enormous meal earlier in the day that was still holding her hunger at bay.

"Can you give us a few more minutes please?" Melinda sensed everyone's hesitation over whether they were eating or not.

"Sure can," the girl replied enthusiastically and then she spun and bounced her way over to the next table.

"I'm not that really interested in eating," Lily voiced her thoughts as she reached to the centre of the table where a small black book had been placed. Inside this menu was what Lily was sure everybody was really after.

After everyone agreed that they too were going to skip the food, they passed around the drinks menu and contemplated what they should start off with.

By the time the waitress came back this time, they had all decided on what they were going to order. Melinda and Lily had decided to start of the night with an elaborately mixed and named shooter, but because that wouldn't last long, and the guys around them had ordered full sized drinks, they decided to also order a cocktail.

When the drinks arrived, Lily was delighted to see the colour of hers. It was a brilliant emerald green and this excited Lily because even though nobody knew this, her favourite colour was green. It was not something she went around boasting about however, because back at Hogwarts, people would start thinking of her as a Slytherin lover and a traitor. All for her love of the colour green. Oh well, she had made herself learn to like scarlet and gold. Or a least appear to like it.

After each drink had been distributed to its proper owner, they all gathered their glasses and clinked them in the air, to cheers of excitement for what the night held in store for them. The guys all took a small swig of their drinks, but Melinda and Lily threw their heads back and swallowed. The green concoction was incredibly fruity and did not burn at all on the way down, contrary to what everybody always said about shooters.

"Not bad," Lily said after she wiped the little bit of liquid that had missed her mouth off of her chin before anybody could notice her mistake.

Ironically at the same time as Lily said that, Melinda said the exact same thing. After realizing what they had both just said in the exact same tone, they both looked at each other and started to giggle.

"So," Melinda turned to face the guy that was sitting next to her, "it's Tom right?"

The black haired boy nodded in response, but didn't actually say anything. In the meantime, Lily was trying to log his name into her brain, with an image of his face attached. Okay, there was a Ty, a Danny and now a Tom. She had three names down, and if she could somehow get the two other guys that they were sitting with's names then she'd be on a role. Unfortunately just when she thought she had figured out the better part of the groups names, their group grew as two more girls wandered in and sat down at the other booth that the other half was occupying. Lily groaned inwardly in frustration, now there was more names.

"Okay Tom, I have a question for you."

Everybody else who was sitting around the table leaned in so they could hear clearly what was about to be said. While the music that was playing was not overly loud, at least in comparison to what had been playing across the street in the club, it was still contributing enough noise that when mixed with everybody's chatter it was just enough to block out a nearby conversation.

"If you were let's say, going to approach a girl in a club or at a party, what is it catches your attention and makes you go over to her?"

Instantly Lily understood what Melinda was getting at. She was asking what she needed to do, to get a guy later on in the night. While they had been getting ready earlier, Melinda had mentioned to her that it was cheeper for girls to go out, because when a guy was interested in you they would by you drinks. Unfortunately for the guys, this could result in a pretty hefty bar tab at the end of the night.

"Well," Tom blushed slightly, "no, never mind."

"No, what is it. You can't just leave me hanging like that," Melinda pleaded and to help out her cause she pursed her lips just so and made her eyes enticingly wide. It worked, because without even having to do anything more, she got Tom to spill his thoughts. Proving that Melinda really didn't need advice on how to manipulate the men around her.

"Okay, okay, so it goes like this. Cleavage…"

Lily nodded, it was so predictable.

"Then what her butt looks like…"

Again, typical.

"And if she's wearing a skirt, which would be wonderful, then her legs…"

Melinda was not in fact wearing a skirt. She had opted for the more conservative look, even though that wasn't exactly who she was. It was a role reversal it appeared. Lily was wearing the tight and skin baring clothes and that wasn't who she really was either, while Melinda was wearing pants, flats and a cute top, but it didn't really go _BAM,_ like how she usually wore her clothes.

"Don't forget the hair," one of the guy's to Lily's right chimed in.

"Oh and the…" his mate tried to add his input, but was shut down before he was completely able to voice his ideas.

"Okay I get it, all you look at is what a girl's got," Melinda huffed, "it's so predictable."

"No, that's not all a guy looks at. It's just all a guy looks at when he's trying to pick up some chick in a bar. That's what you were asking for right? Because really, if you're looking for a girl in a bar it's not likely you want it to progress to anything serious. It's all fun, so really her intellect and her personality don't really matter. I mean you're not going to be solving all the world's problems with her in the dark corner of that bar. If you're even really lucky, you might not have to even talk much with her at all. Therefore it doesn't really matter what she has to say. If I wanted to pick up some brilliant girl, I'd just turn to the next one sitting beside me in class. But that's not how things are done on a Friday night," the mate reasoned, apparently in an attempt to keep himself a part of the conversation that was trying to exclude him.

He did have a point, Lily couldn't help but muse. After all, if she was going to approach a guy tonight, it would not be due to his personality. Really, when the music was pounding in your ears, it didn't matter how ugly of a personality they had. You really couldn't make conversation with them. When you were out having fun, you were allowed to be vain and go for the good looking person. Get it out of your system, because when you later go on to choose who to be in a serious relationship with, that's when looks begin to loose their value and other traits become weighted more heavily.

As everyone sipped their drinks and loosened up to those around them, Lily felt herself relaxing, but at the same time she was also getting anxious. While she was having a lot of fun doing exactly what they were doing, she really wanted to get over to the club to see where that part of the evening may lead. It appeared that nobody else was quite in as much of a hurry, so Lily soon settled back in and decided that what would happen would happen and she's probably have a better night if she just let things play out as they were intended to. Luckily for her, this would swing in favour of Lily later in the evening.

The conversation rolled along rather nicely, but whenever there was a momentarily lull in the chatter, somebody would break out with the topic of choice for getting everyone laughing again, and that was exactly what the guy to Lily's right did by saying, "Seriously, I can't believe you'd rank legs over cleavage."

"What do you mean," defended Tom, "that your eyes don't go directly to what her chest looks like? Come on man, you're lying."

"No, I'm just saying that they should be tied for first place, because I don't know about you but for me one eye is on her chest while the other is scanning the scenery much lower down. If you know what I mean," he burst out in laughter apparently in response to his own intelligence, or what he perceived to be intelligence.

This caused a roar of laughter from everyone situated around the table. While the topic of choice was kind of crude at least in Lily's opinion, the fact that she was a few drinks into the night helped ease her mind and make it all comical.

Due to the fact that their empty glasses had accumulated in the centre of he table, the waitress stopped by to offer another round and to clear away the dead soldiers. This time Lily decided to forgo the mixed fruity drink and just go for the straight alcohol. It wasn't like she was foreign to the concept. After all back in the Gryffindor Common room after a wonderful outcome in Quidditch or the like, nobody usually thought to bring mixes or chasers for their drinks. Sometimes you'd even show up to the after party and realize the organizers-or instigators as they might better be called-had been in such a rush that they had forgotten to gather a collection of goblets or mugs to drinks out of. This had more often than not contributed to the bottle being freely passed around for people to take swigs out of. Oh the memories she had. They even got more entertaining as the years wore on and she became a Prefect. She could recall at least one time having people pin her down and force her to drink, all to say they caught the Prefect drinking at the after party.

While waiting for their next round to arrive, Lily turned to the two guys that she didn't know the names of and said, "I feel kind of stupid now doing this, but it's really messing with my head that I don't know either of your names."

This earned her a smile from the two guys her comment had been directed at.

"Well, I'm Ian," the one that was closest to her on her right introduced himself.

"And I'm Alex. It's Lily right, I think that's what I heard somebody calling you?"

Lily nodded and gave them a hint of a smile. It was always awkward realizing part way through an event that you needed to introduce yourself, something that you should have done right off the bat. On the plus side however, the way Lily had done it had ensured that her brain which was usually just a sieve for names, actually withheld something for once.

_Ty, Danny, Tom, Ian, Alex and repeat,_ Lily listed off the names in her mind of those that she had been formally introduced to. Hopefully they'd stick, and so far it was looking like they would.

Their next tray of drinks arrived shortly after that and before Lily knew it she was feeling slightly tipsy. She decided then that it was probably a good point to back off. Not so much now because she didn't want to get drunk, but because she didn't want to spend an absolute fortune on alcohol. Lily had had just enough experience around booze to know that if she started to feel tipsy instantly after a shot, then it was only going to progress as time went on. While she had only had three drinks at the pub, her and Melinda had sipped at a cocktail earlier while getting ready. So she was four drinks in if her count was correct. Typically six could bring her to a fun point that resulted in little after effects the following day, and anything beyond that could end up spelling trouble. While Lily was still incredibly innocent, she did know what it felt to take her drinking to far. Needless to say it had not been a pleasant experience, and it was one such milestone in her life that she never wished to replicate.

Those around Lily ordered another round shortly after, because they had all just done shots the last time, but Lily waved away the waitress' enquiry for what she wanted next. While Lily enjoyed that she could now handle her alcohol, and she could have several drinks and still hold her own, sometimes she thought it would be nice to be a cheap drunk. Therefore you didn't have to shell out the money required to get you to that point that you wanted to be at. Oh well, everything had it's pros and cons.

Just when Lily again got around to thinking that they should probably be heading back across the street sometime soon because it was now after eleven o'clock, Ty came strolling over and placed his palms flat down on the table. He leaned in, placing the majority of his upper body weight on the table and said, "What's going on over in this neck of town? You all having as much fun over here as we are?"

His speech was definitely slurred and it was pretty evident that if the table were to suddenly vanish, he would go crashing down to the ground because there was no way his brain would be able to register and react towards what was happening in such a short period of time.

"Hey mate, it's all good over here. We're having a brilliant time, but we should probably get going pretty quickly. We can always come back if nothings happening yet over there," Alex said.

_Finally,_ Lily sighed in her head with relief. Somebody else was concerned that they weren't going to make it back to the club.

Over the span of the next ten minutes or so, everybody polished off the dregs of their drinks and settled the bill. As they stepped back out onto the street, everybody did a collective double take. The street which had been a moderately busy place earlier when they had first walked into the pub, was now packed with people. Only a little over an hour had passed, but it was enough time to pack the people in. The night was really just beginning Lily realized. People were spilling out of the door ways to different establishments and the line ups to get in were growing by the minute. Luckily for their group, they had got their hands stamped before the rush and so they didn't have to even wait in line to go back in. All they had to do was step through the security personal at the door once again. This time Lily had her bag ready to present to the big man who was doing the searching, but unlike last time, he just waved her on through.

The atmosphere of the club this time around was much different then the last time they had wandered through. To be honest, it was exactly the opposite. The dance floor was absolutely packed and people were actually spilling into the bar area and the entrance way. There was standing room only around the long bar, and their group had to push and elbow their way through. Lily was constantly keeping an eye on Melinda who was several steps in front of her. It was easiest to keep tract of one person instead of a whole group, and it really didn't matter if two people together lost the rest, as long as nobody was left alone. It was a good thing Lily had been watching Melinda closely, because as soon as she parted a path through the crowd, it quickly swallowed her up. By the time they made it through the crowd around the bar, at least half of their group had disappeared. To where, nobody quite knew.

Oddly enough a few minutes later they all ended up at the same spot. It was a little chunk of dance floor that they would quickly lay claim to and occupy for the remainder of the night. It sure made things a lot easier to know that you could wander out of the mob of dancers to catch your breath or use the bathroom, and still be able to come back and not have to search for the lost group. It sure was amazing how quickly people could disappear into the crowds, and especially considering how dark it was.

Right off the bat everybody began to dance in a circle. Nobody paired off into couples quite yet which sort of surprised Lily. While she did know that the muggle way of dancing was more informal than the wizardry way, it still sometimes shocked her when she had to jump back and forth between cultures. It was akin to jumping back at least a century in muggle times, every time Lily stepped back through the barrier at King's Cross Station. Gone were the ways of modern technology such as the telephone, television and the like. Even electricity was not prevalent in the wizarding world, instead they relied on candles, torches and chandeliers. Yes, a good hundred years in the past the wizarding world was operating in. The list of modern technologies were not the only thing that was different. No, the way of life and hierarchy of family was much similar to that of Victorian England, than of 1970 England. How else could you explain the fanaticism with social status? In the wizarding world, people used proper etiquette, maintained their dignity and their family name and more appropriate to the current state of affairs, they also danced like their grandmother was watching. With a long stick in hand that she was going to rack across the back of your knees if you didn't maintain the proper posture and keep perfect time to the waltz that was playing, and don't even think about trying to lead if you were the woman.

No, the dancing that Lily was taking part it was not your grandparent's idea of tasteful dance. It probably wasn't even anybody's parent's idea of what dancing should be, but that wasn't stopping anybody, including Lily from letting loose and shaking it out on the dance floor.

Lily began by rocking her hips back and forth. It was not necessarily a move she was very accustom to making and so it started out easy as she felt really self-conscious. As the song began to speed up however, it became easier and easier for Lily to loose herself to the beat. She wasn't the only one either. Before she knew it she was jumping up and down with all the people around her, with her arms extended in the air.

They danced and danced to song after song that Lily did not actually know. It was hard to be away from society for so many months at a time, and then have to come back in and pretend to all of her muggle friends that she knew what they were talking about in regard to the latest celebrity gossip or music news. Apparently the songs they were dancing to were a favourite of everyones, because the dance floor was packed and nobody seemed to be leaving. The problem with not knowing or really liking the music that was playing, was that it was hard to stay interested for long, but Lily forced herself to stay out there with everyone.

Pretty soon after that, Lily realized that she could no longer spot Melinda in their little clump of people. This caused Lily to stop dancing right where she was standing and swivel around in the hopes that she would be able to locate her lost friend. It turned out that Melinda really wasn't truly lost. She had just ventured off of the dance floor to sit at one of the tables that had been recently vacated that lined the side of the dance floor. Lily decided to wander over than way and just when she got over to the table and leaned on it, Melinda downed another shot along with Ian and Alex, the guys they had been sitting with at the pub. For a little bit Lily was disappointed that she had missed out on another drink. She was beginning to feel far too sober to be at a club. Everybody around her was well past the tipsy point, and if Lily had to be quite honest, she didn't even think she was mildly tipsy.

She had stopped drinking at the bar because she had thought she was about to reach her fun point. A point which she never actually reached and it was definitely beginning to get awkward being around so many drunk people when you were so sober. She couldn't really complain though, because she very well could have walked herself over to the bar and ordered herself a drink. What was holding her back however was that she didn't think that if she walked up to a bartender, that she'd actually be able to hear what they were saying in order to order a drink. The noise level in the place was just through the roof, and so Lily stayed back at the table with Melinda and her two drinking buddies.

Now that Lily was away from the dance floor, she took this opportunity to scan the crowd and observe what everybody was doing. As she did this, she couldn't help but chuckle at the fact that it was to much earlier in the night that she was talking with Melinda about how girls could just get drinks bought for them by guys at the clubs. So far, no guy had approached Lily or even paid her any attention. It was starting to become apparent that maybe Lily's magical night of leaving her total innocence behind was not going to happen. After all, Lily had originally thought that maybe one of the many guys they were meeting up with would be the one to steal her first kiss, but that was proving unlikely to happen. It was odd, those guys already seemed like good friends to Lily, and she hadn't even spend much time with them, or knew their names for very long. The problem with that was that when Lily did finally get comfortable around guys, which took her usually quite awhile, she never really wanted to step out of the boundary of friends because she didn't want to loose that connection. It was problematic for sure, and that was probably one of the reasons that had led to Lily being the only girl in her year without a first kiss story to share.

To top it all off, now because Lily felt like she was so far behind experience wise of those around her, she really didn't want to get involved with somebody she cared about for fear that she would disgust them with her lack of skills and knowledge and ultimately drive them away. While most people would have been more nervous to pick up a random guy in a bar, that was what Lily was hoping would happen. Simply because she could gain some experience and not be completely naive next time with somebody she cared about. It was probably not the most responsible way of doing it, or the way most people chose to do things, but hey what other choice did she have? At least with some random guy you could walk away and never by hurt by what he had to say.

After everyone finished up with their quick breather, they all headed back out onto the dance floor and reintegrated themselves back into their group. It was at this point that things started to get a bit more interesting for Lily whose was facing into the centre of the dance floor, with her back towards the tables.

They hadn't been out on the floor for long when Lily saw some guy come up behind Melinda and start dancing with her from behind. Melinda quickly adjusted her moves and leaned into him and moved along with him. Her hands snacked their way up to his face and she curled her fingers up through his hair. Overall, it was a really well executed move. Before Lily had really had time to process much more of what she was seeing another guy had come up behind her and pressed himself up close to her back.

Initially Lily's first reaction was shock. While it was what she had expected and hoped clubbing to be like, up until that point it had not happened. To top it all off, it was an odd sensation to be so close to somebody of the opposite sex. If Lily was going to be honest she would have to say that the only other time she had been this close to a guy was when she was still in the muggle school system and her class had held a dance. It had been the first and last time Lily had danced with a boy, but they had not danced anything like this. They had faced each other, their eyes darting around anywhere that didn't require them to make eye contact, and they had held each other at arms length. When Lily had earlier said that she had no experience with boys, she really did mean it. She had never even held a boy's hand, so this while exhilarating was still way beyond her comfort level. The problem was, if she never toed that line, then she'd never loose her innocence, so she had to sacrifice and just take it slow. Push it a little, but not to much, and so that's why Lily didn't instantly pull away when the guy pushed himself into her. What occurred next was kind of bizarre.

Lily was slightly uncomfortable and she figured it had something to do with not being able to see the guy that was behind her. It felt like she was being dominated, and had little control over the situation. Before she knew it her hips were swaying back and forth in time with his. Almost instinctively she arched her back just slightly to extend her butt just a little bit more into his crotch, so far so good. The continued to rock back and forth but Lily's mind was racing. She had just witnessed how easily Melinda had drawn her partner into her by extending her arms and working them up to his hair. Was she supposed to do something like that as well? She really wasn't comfortable doing it however, so she decided to just keep dancing. Pretty quickly however Lily and the guys hip movements got out of sink due to the fact that the guy started to grind against her instead of dancing. His hands which had been previously rested on her hips began to edge their way down to where they were now resting on the crease where her legs met her body. It was only a short jump from there to an area that she was not willing to let a guy get anywhere near touching tonight. Even though her body had begun to tingle all over from the closeness of his hands. A reaction that she was scolding her body for having because she really didn't want to feel that towards this guy who she felt was taking advantage of her.

To keep herself moderately in control of the situation, Lily placed her hands on top of the guys and slowly edged them back up to her hips. There, now she was feeling a bit better. His hands traveling south had momentarily distracted Lily from realizing what he was doing next. It was at this point that Lily's body pretty much froze up, but her mind went into overdrive in panic mode.

The guy had latched onto her hips and started to vigorously grind himself up against her. He pulled her in even tighter to his body if that was even possible and worked his crotch deeper into the muscles of Lily's butt and she could feel absolutely everything being squashed up against her body. His hands trailed back down to the spot they had been resting on earlier, despite Lily's hands having been resting on top of them. It was at this point as the rotations of his hips speed up that any pleasure was lost for Lily and all she could think about was one thing, _he's trying to get off._ A foul taste instantly rose up Lily's throats as she quickly became unfrozen. She hastily threw his hands off of her and made a beeline for her friends which had ventured off more into the centre of the dance floor. She didn't get very far, because the guy, obviously not taking to kindly to being cut off so harshly had tried to pull her back to him. He placed his mouth right by her ear and slurred something into Lily's ear that didn't even sound like any language she had ever heard of. Again Lily threw off his hands, this time a little more forcefully and she didn't hesitate in the slightest when getting out of there.

Once she made it back to the safety of her group she let out the breath that she didn't know she had been holding. She was absolutely disgusted. She felt violated primarily and ashamed, because she had come to the club hoping for a guy to pay her some attention and then look what had happened, she had been too uncomfortable to take control of the situation for her own advantage. Hadn't she earlier been claiming that she wanted guys to buy her drinks, and then look what she had done. It was then that Lily realized she was being stupid. She should for no reason be feeling awful for what had just happened. The interaction that she had just experienced had by no means been a symbiotic relationship. The key detail being that he had come up behind her and not even allowed her to see his face. This caused a wave of nausea to roll through Lily's entire system. She was now absolutely disgusted with herself that she had even initially leaned into him to dance. The primary thought that was taking over her brain was that she had pretty much just encouraged him to violate her. Maybe she wasn't cut out for clubbing, or relationships with the opposite sex for that matter.

There was really no use worrying over it now. She had taken control of the situation once she realized what was really happening, and had got out of there as soon as she could, and for that she was proud of herself. What was done, was done and she couldn't change anything, she could just learn from it.

From that point on, Lily did always keep in the back of her mind an escape route. She had come into the night knowing that clubbing was potentially dangerous. Somebody could slip something in your drink, you could drink to much and get taken advantage of or even just not know how to safely get home. Now she was glad that she had not had anything more to drink, because the alcohol would have numbed her sense of right and wrong, just enough that maybe she wouldn't have thought anything of what had happened to her. It was definitely a scary thought.

When the next guy came up to her, Lily wasn't as willing this time to even just dance. She was still slightly traumatized from what she had just about allowed to occur. Luckily for Lily her guard was up and she was prepared for what could happen. This time the guy approached her from behind again and reached for her arm and tried to pull her off the dance floor. Lily knew right away that he was a different guy because he leaned over close to her ear just as the other guy had done, but this time he spoke clearly in English.

In a very seductive tone he whispered-or yelled, the music was just incredibly loud, "Can I buy you a drink?"

Sitting back in Melinda's bedroom Lily had predicted that she would have been over the moon when and if this occurred at some point during the night. The fact that Lily had just experienced what she had gone through had dulled her excitement, and increased her wariness. The fact that he had tried to pull her off the dance floor, again without allowing her to see his face had raised warning flags in Lily's mind.

Lily turned to face him and stood her ground, "No, not tonight," she yelled, but her voice sounded hollow and weak due to the pounding music.

The guy obviously didn't hear her response, or decided not to listen to it, because before Lily knew it, she was being led by the elbow away from her friends. This only spelled out trouble for Lily because once he got her off the dance floor he could easily drag her off into the stairway and push her up against the wall. As much as Lily would have liked to think she would have been able to stop whatever would have happened, she actually knew she would be no match for a guy that was nearly twice her weight and several inches taller than herself. If things had have been different however, and they had been in her world instead of his, Lily knew he would not actually stand a chance. With her wand in her hand, Lily could do amazing and amazingly painful things. The Marauder's could attest to that when she had run into them on that one occasion. It had not been her most shining moment as a human being, but she was still proud of it because it did show her skills as a witch, but that story was for another day.

Back to the current situation Lily was finding herself in yet again. The guy had her by the elbow and was pulling her towards the darker corner of the club where the staircase was to take them up to the balcony level. Suddenly they stopped and that was his mistake. He moved his body closer to hers again and said, "So, can I buy you a drink?"

Lily's initial thought was somewhere in the ballpark of asking him what he planned on slipping in her drink while he got it for her, but she didn't voice this. Instead she just said firmly, "No!" and then she pulled her arm out of his grasp and walked away. There, she had handled that one a little bit better.

As Lily made her way back over to her friends she realized three very important things. Firstly, she should always find a way to dance with her back into the centre of the dance floor, because if she was on the outskirts of the circle facing the crowd, anybody could just come easily and drag her away. Secondly, it would always be handy to have a guy friend around that you would be comfortable to be able to throw your arms around at any second and pretend that he was your boyfriend in order to get some creep to leave you alone. Lastly, and probably most importantly Lily realized what had been bothering her about the way the last two events had played out. It had been that she had been approached from behind and couldn't see who it was that was in her space. She figured she would have no problem getting more physical with a guy, or having a drink with them if they approached her from the front respectively and introduced themselves. That way she would have a name and a face, and Lily suspected that would just be enough for her to lay down a little bit of her guard that had rapidly been assembling over the last several minutes. She made a mental note to inform any guy that was asking how you picked up a girl in a club that the best way to do it was just with a simple smile and an exchange of names. It went a long way in building a girls trust.

Lily immersed herself in the dancing clump of her group, but she found that she was not enjoying herself now. There were currently too many things running through her brain for her to just simply relax and dance. Somehow their clump began to make a push into the centre of the dance floor. Lily felt herself being carried along with them as they moved along. Pretty quickly they were right up next to the stage and Lily had to blink to make sure she was really seeing what she was seeing. Ty had jumped up on the stage and started dancing. It didn't look as bad actually as this sounded, because he wasn't up there alone. He was surrounded by a group of girls and it appeared like he was having the time of his life. The top buttons on his shirt had become undone and so the material was hanging at an odd angle, but it did not concern him in the least because he was just having a blast, and he was really too drunk to care.

While watching Ty up on stage it became apparent to Lily just how much he actually had had to drink. Eventually Ty made his way down off the stage, but it was mainly against his will because a couple of the members of their group that had been sitting at the other table at the pub so Lily did not know their names, actually had to drag him by the arms down onto solid ground. It was at this point that Lily realized there was no way she could continue on in her night and hope that Ty would be her first kiss.

They all continued to dance, and dance some more but Lily was feeling really out of it. She was tired from her extremely long and eventful day, and her legs were getting stiff from all the dancing. Overall, the night had lost its appeal and she was ready to go home and climb in under the sheets of a comfy bed. What kept Lily from just saying that she was ready to go home was that when she looked around she realized that she could not see Melinda, and that she actually hadn't seen her in some time. The anxiousness to leave that had been overwhelming LIly was quickly replaced by fear for her friend. How long had she been gone for? They had promised to look after each other and now look what she had done.

Lily's brain was torn, should she venture off and try to track down Melinda or should she just stay with the group and wait for her to return? If she ventured away, Lily worried that she wouldn't find everybody again or that they would all leave and leave her behind. She couldn't just stand around and wait and hope she returned, because what if by some slim chance something had actually happened?

Not knowing what to do, Lily turned to the person that was right beside her. It was Danny. Lily remembered that Melinda had told her that this scene was not something Danny was really into, so he'd be watching out for everybody and doing head counts the entire night. He also wasn't really into getting drunk, so if Lily turned to him for help she figured she would get a mostly clear-headed individual. She was right. As soon as she turned to Danny and screamed directly into his ear what was bothering her, he nodded. He grabbed her arm and pulled her from the midst of the dance floor. He then led her over to the stairway which was just sheltered enough in the corner that it was slightly quieter.

"Have you seen Melinda? I need to find her?"

"No," he shook his head, "let's go!"

First they circled the main floor of the club, but to no avail. Melinda was not anywhere. Lily didn't know where the loos were, but she figured Melinda had been gone for so long that she just hadn't escape to freshen up.

Danny then walked back over to the staircase and began to climb it, with Lily right on his tail. Once at the top of the stairs he made his way right over to the railing that allowed them to look over the entire dance floor. It was a good idea actually, and Lily kicked herself for not having thought of it herself. From their vantage point they could so everyone down in the crowds. Lily did a quick scan of all the faces but did not come up with anything, so she scanned again but this time a little bit slower. What she realized as she was doing this was if she ever lost her group on the dance floor, this was the perfect spot to come to find them. As she was doing her scans she didn't realize that Danny had disappeared from beside her. In a panic, Lily swivelled around and searched frantically now for him too. He hadn't gone far. He had placed himself down on one of the couches that Lily had seen earlier on their first exploratory trip through the club, and sitting right beside him was Melinda!

Lily rushed over to sit down on the opposite couch. She was incredibly relieved to have found her friend and she showed this to Danny by shooting him a grateful smile, which he returned.

Where they were sitting was incredibly dark. There was no lights up on the balcony and the only glow that was present was from what had drifted up from down below. Therefore Lily couldn't actually see who Melinda was sitting beside. When the strobe light down below started to flash it gave Lily just enough light to realize that she did not in fact recognize the face of the person who was wedged between the wall and Melinda's body. That was odd, but Lily didn't really think much of it. Firstly because she was incredibly bad at recognizing faces-almost more so than her inability to remember names-and the group they were with was pretty large. He was probably just one of the guys that had been sitting at the other table in the pub so Lily didn't get to meet him.

Pretty quickly after they had sat down, Danny jumped back up and headed down to the dance floor once again. He had done his duty for the two stupid younger girls who couldn't keep track of each other, and now he was going to head back to his real friends. Or that was what Lily thought he was probably thinking about in his mind as he made his way down the dark staircase.

Besides Melinda sitting on the set of couches, there were two other people that Lily did not recognize. Melinda was sitting right next to one of them on the couch that was facing the one that Lily and the other one was sitting on. The other occupant on Lily's couch was sitting tucked away in the corner at the very far end, whereas Lily was perched on the edge. She was wanting to tell Melinda that she was ready to go, but even though it was slightly quiet there than down below on the dance floor, it was still to loud to yell across the table that separated them. The other thing that kept Lily from dragging her friend home was that Melinda was deep in conversation with her friend. Therefore Lily just sat there, feeling awkward because Melinda knew these people better than she did.

Suddenly the guy who was sitting in the corner scooted across the open expanse of couch and rested himself back down right beside Lily. He leaned over and screamed into Lily's ear, "I guess our friends aren't going anywhere anytime soon, so we might as well and not sit separately," or at least that's what Lily thought he had said.

She nodded her head to show that she had understood what he had been trying to say, but she never really looked at him. Instead she kept staring off out over the balcony, at the bar, anywhere really. She was tired and as much as she would have liked to talk with somebody, she knew the noise level would not make it easy. To top it all off, as outgoing as Lily may have outwardly appeared, she was actually pretty shy and she was extremely bad at making up topics to talk about with a complete stranger. On the other hand, she could talk your ear off if you were her friend. It was all a matter of comfort.

Lily realized she should have said something witty in reply to the guy, but she was at a loss. Things were mulling around in her brain, such as the question on whether or not she was supposed to know him? From how he had worded his opening line, she didn't think so.

They sat in silence, actually they didn't but they didn't say anything more so it was technically a silence in conversations. Then he leaned over again, "I'm James."

Lily's mind suddenly went into hyperdrive. Did she hear that correctly? She had been having a nice, pleasant summer up until that point due to nobody being around by the name of James, and then suddenly this one walked into her life. Maybe she had heard him wrong. It could have been Tames or Zames, that was quite possible wasn't it? Considering the decibel level of the music she didn't know. It took her a minute, but Lily's manners came flooding back to her and she extended her hand. She didn't know if it was the proper etiquette to shake somebody's hand when meeting them in this sort of setting, but she did it anyway because it's how she always had introduced herself to new people.

"Lily," she smiled as she turned her head slightly, but still she didn't get a good look at his face. Partly due to him being in the shadows, and also because she really wasn't that interested, oddly enough. She felt that if she looked at him head on and stared at his face, she would have to come up with something to say in the conversation and she really didn't want to. When she had just said her name, her voice had sounded incredibly hollow to herself. It sounded like she was in a long tunnel and she suspected this was probably the end of her having her voice for the next few days.

"So, what bring you here tonight?" he leaned back over and his lips brushed up against her ear, they were so close.

Lily didn't know what to say, or better yet, how to word it into the least possible number of words, "Just visiting some friends for the weekend and we ended up here."

"Cool," there his lips were there again, "it's my friend's birthday so we're just doing the rounds. You know."

By now Lily was paying attention, but she was at a loss for what to say. Luckily enough for her, he was back with some of his own questions.

"You live around here?"

Yes, no, what was the answer to that? She always struggled when people asked her about where she lived and where she went to school. Usually she just said she went to boarding school in Scotland, but sometimes that got problematic when people knew of the popular schools there and she had to explain exactly where she went, or didn't.

"No, I go to school in Scotland. It's my last weekend here before I leave."

"Oh really," he yelled, or at least that's what it sounded like. It was incredibly muffled. It really was amazing Lily that they were able to hold even a little bit of conversation, "What are you studying?"

Ah yes, the next dreaded question. Usually it didn't come up when she was around kids and teenagers or people that knew her actual age, but this guy was probably believing she was in University so she decided to just play along, "Nothing really in particular."

"I'm the same," he then named one of the smaller Colleges in the city that he was a student of. Lily had heard reference to the school before and she knew the general area where it was located and so as she desperately searched for something to say to keep the conversation going she came up with something that was by no means witty, but would keep them talking or rather yelling, "So do you live around there or are you from somewhere else?"

"Nah, lived there all my life."

He leaned back against the backrest of the couch and Lily awkwardly looked around. Across from them, Melinda and her friend which Lily now knew was a new friend were deep in conversation and every so often they would break from speaking and laugh. Lily sighed, how could they maintain a flowing conversation like that, and even more importantly, how could they hear each other?

This time Lily leaned over and held her lips right up close to his ear to say, "It seems they have an endless supply of things to talk about," she commented on Melinda's conversation skills but she felt awkward saying this. Usually Lily was a pretty bright girl but she felt like she was really sucking at this conversation. She felt incredibly embarrassed and couldn't help but think that the poor guy beside her was most likely itching to get on his way. It was typical, no wonder she had had no luck with any guys before, she simply sucked at it. She couldn't even bring herself to look at him.

Apparently both Lily and the guy-James she thought she remembered his name correctly-had absolutely exhausted their supply of small talk and so Lily came to accept as the seconds ticked on that nothing more would be said between them.

Suddenly his lips were by her ear again and what came out shocked her, plain and simple, "So, I'm a little bit drunk and I'm just going to come out with it, can I kiss you?"

At least that was what it sounded like to Lily. Rather dumbly she said a hurried, "Yes," without even thinking as she nodded simultaneously, because she had realized he would not be able to actually hear her considering how far away he was from her. Lily's heart had started to race. She was both excited and terrified. Probably more scared because she didn't have the foggiest idea of what she was supposed to do. All she knew was that he would have to make the moves. From her hasty reply of _yes,_ to when his lips met hers, she felt like she was floating in a fog and was really unable to comprehend what was happening.

Lily adjusted herself slightly so that instead of having her back against the backrest, her left side was no leaning against it. He did the same so that they were facing each other. It was a good thing that there was practically no light reaching them because Lily was sure her face was incredibly flushed. She could feel it heat up as they sat there and awkwardly stared at each other. Even though they were facing each other, Lily couldn't bring her eyes up to look into his. It just seemed too intimate of a gesture now and so she held her gaze right around his lips.

A few seconds ticked by and they sat looking at each other, but nobody made a move. Fear gripped Lily and she thought for a minute he was going to pull away and say she missed her chance and he was out of there. Now that she had come this far, she did not want to miss her chance. She felt like that was what she had been doing her entire life, and tonight it was no more.

Somewhere Lily had heard mention of the guy having to go 90% of the way, and the girl would go the other 10%, or some set of numbers like that, so when he finally leaned in slightly, Lily knew she had to as well or he truly would pull away in disgust. So, ever so slightly she leaned her head in and then before she knew he got fed up with only slight movements and dove right in and his lips were on hers.

Lily was an over-analyzer and so throughout the kiss her brain simply failed to stop screaming things at her.

When people usually had their first kiss it was quite often just a quick peck between two embarrassed kids playing some sort of game with their friends. Eventually a peck would lead to a closed mouth kiss and then slowly a little tongue would work its way in. Lily had missed the gradual stepping stones that would build her up to snogging, and now due to her age or at least the age she was pretending to be for the night, it was assumed she had a lot more experience than she actually had. On top of not knowing what she was doing, something that Lily never liked to experience, she also had the thought plaguing the back of her mind, that she would have no easy stepping stones to get her to full on snogging. Those were two of the biggest things that had kept Lily up until this point from actively going out and trying to change her situation.

Much to her surprise then, when his mouth opened right away and his tongue started to dance around her lips, she actually felt like she was prepared and knew what to do. It probably didn't seem like that to him, but really it wasn't a big deal. He had told her himself that he was drunk, and she'd never see him again, so no big deal right?

All of these thoughts were flashing rapidly through Lily's brain as the first seconds of her first kiss took place. It was then that she realized what she was actually doing, and she mentally screamed at her brain to be quiet. She was going to enjoy this, not overanalyze it and so that's what she set out to do. She couldn't help but joyfully scream to herself in her mind that yes it was actually happening as much as it didn't seem real, she was getting her first kiss. Finally!

While her hands didn't exactly know where to go, her lips apparently did, because right from the get-go as soon as his tongue had flickered across her lips she had opened her mouth. Lily realized she probably shouldn't have her eyes wide open so she closed them gently and took in the kiss. His lips and tongue were soft and moist, but it wasn't slobbery or anything. It was an odd sensation though to feel the different textures of the inside of his mouth. She didn't know if she quite liked it, and she didn't know why everybody said it was such an amazing thing to snog. It really wasn't doing it for her. It was just kind of odd. But she kept at it. All the while trying to come to terms with what to kiss actually felt like.

Suddenly he pulled his head away and repositioned the tilt of his head. This just felt awkward to Lily and before she knew it they were back to their original position.

She adjusted her body slightly because it felt like she was sliding down on the seat, and he started to move his hands around. Lily realized she should move her hands too, because they had been sitting in the same spot this whole time. Their lips stayed locked throughout this process and Lily traced her right hand gently back and forth along his shoulder and then slowly she moved it down his back, just slightly.

For a second he pulled away and his lips momentarily hovered over her jawline. This made Lily quickly uneasy. She really wasn't ready for him to kiss down her neck. It felt far to personal of a thing for who he was, and she had a sinking feeling that if his lips trailed away from hers, she would probably wake up tomorrow to a giant hickey on the side of her neck. That was definitely something she didn't want so she turned her head slightly and recaptured his lips with hers. It was amazing her now how long her first kiss was lasting. While she was enjoying having the experience, she still wasn't entirely convinced that she enjoyed kissing. She reasoned that she was just carrying it out this long, because really what else did she have to do?

Rather smoothly he maneuvered his one hand which had been resting gently on her hip, down to her thigh. He laid it down gently just on the point where her skirt ended and her bare leg began. While her skirt was actually knee length, the fact that it was incredibly tight and she hadn't pulled it down all night, meant that it had actually ridden up a fair ways, so where his hand was now sitting was on the upper half of her thigh.

It was at that point that Lily finally understood why people liked to snog. It wasn't so much the contact of lip on lip, but it was the hands.

His hand that was resting on her thigh slowly began to move around on her leg. It was a rather delicate procedure as he trailed his finger tips along her thigh. The pads of his fingers just lightly brushing over the material of her skirt. It was just enough. Now Lily liked snogging, no correction, she loved it. The feeling that had rapidly developed in between her legs was incredibly. She now understood what it felt like to be turned on, and what that actually meant. Even though she had tried things on her own, and thought she had succeeded, none of it had ever felt as good as the tingling was feeling now. It was magical and now she didn't want it to end.

The small circles that had been being traced on her outer thigh abruptly stopped, and in its place the tingly inside of Lily began to grow more intense as his hand took a turn for the top of her thigh. As much as she was enjoying this and would have let him do this, something in Lily's brain-the common sense portion of it actually-decided to take matters into its own hands, literally. Without really knowing what she was doing, Lily's hand shot out and she gently placed it on top of his that had edged its way high up her leg. Getting closer and closer to an area that Lily knew she wasn't actually comfortable with him getting acquainted with, but it really was hard to stop him. It just felt so incredibly good. The still sane part of her mind was grateful though that his hands had stopped wandering when she laid hers over his. It showed that he respected her wishes, unlike a lot of the guys down on the dance floor earlier.

Now the odd things that she had been thinking earlier about kissing were long gone. The different feels of his tongue flicking against hers was not a disgusting feeling as she had originally felt it to be. The fantastic sensation between Lily's legs had begun to slowly dissipate due to James' hands staying in one spot, much to Lily's disappointment. So just when she was about to lift up her hand and give him a bit of free rein, but not a lot, he pulled out of the kiss.

Lily knew right away that that was the end and he wasn't just adjusting his position because he leaned back against the back rest and relaxed. Now for the awkward part. Lily had known all along that Melinda and her guy friend were sitting across from them, probably seeing everything that they were doing, but all the while trying to be respectful and not actually watch. Initially Lily hadn't cared because she was getting her first kiss, and then later on the fact that he was turning her on was enough to wipe her mind clear of any thoughts in regard to who was watching them. Even though they were in a darkened corner, they were still in an incredibly public place.

_And that's how you do it gentleman,_ Lily thought to herself. Had she not just thought earlier that if a guy introduced himself like a respectful person, things would go more in their favour?

Melinda was sitting beside her guy but she was watching Lily rather closely, and so Lily just smiled. Or maybe she smirked, she didn't really know. All she knew was that she was just over the moon with excitement.

James and Lily sat beside each other, their arms just brushing, but neither of them said anything. It was probably a good thing Lily thought, because if he did say something it probably wouldn't be anything in her favour. After all he had thought he was snagging some drunk girl to take home for the night and instead he had actually got one that was quite sober, innocent beyond belief and overly eager to shut down any move he tried to make. Oh well, Lily had finally got her first kiss. She wanted to dance and around and scream it to the world. She was no longer an innocent little prude. She had just snogged some guy in a dark club. Take that all you girls who laughed when Lily said in their confessional that she had never been kissed, she now had a first kiss story that was better than anybody else's which was only about a slobbery peck on the lips that was actually intended for their cheek at some family get together.

While it felt like they sat there for a long time, both her and him arm to arm but not saying anything, it was actually probably only a minute at most. Melinda was still staring at Lily actually, so it couldn't honestly have been that long since they'd broken it up. Before she knew it though he had stood up and bolted without a word even to his friend. Lily was partially hurt, partially relieved because she had been considering bolting if the awkward lack of conversation continued for much longer. She was hurt though because he just left without a word. It wasn't like she was expecting his phone number or even a last name or anything, but she just found it odd. Then again, she kicked herself, what did she really expect? It had been no strings attached. That's why people went out clubbing after all. Really, what did she expect him to say? A _thanks, _or a _take care_, would have just been incredibly uncomfortable.

Up until that point Lily had just wanted to get her first kiss out of the way, but now she was seeing what people meant when they said you'll remember it forever. She felt an attachment now to this guy, whoever he was and she was sort of sad to see it walk away. Even though she knew it did mean nothing.

Currently Lily now had the entire expanse of couch all to herself, and it was an odd feeling. Melinda just kept straying at her, so Lily quickly jumped up to her feet and scooted around the end of the table. She then proceeded to sit down next to Melinda.

"So what's your plan?" Lily screamed into her friends ear.

Melinda shrugged her shoulders nonchalantly, "I don't know."

Now Lily was torn. She wasn't to keen on getting up and leaving Melinda alone with some strange guy, and she didn't want to get permanently separated from her friend. But it was also pretty uncomfortable to be sitting down next to a guy and a girl who Lily was pretty sure were hoping to snog.

Instead of saying or doing anything, Lily just looked out over the edge of the balcony and searched the crowd for some faces that she recognized. What instantly drew her attention to the group she had come with was Ty's bright shirt, glowing under the strobe lights. Relief coursed through Lily, because now she knew if she got up and left Melinda to have her privacy, she herself wouldn't be roaming around lost.

"I'm going to head back downstairs. Come find me later," Lily raised the level of her voice to one that should have been absolutely deafening, but the confused look on Melinda's face told Lily that she hadn't even heard what she had been trying to say. Thus Lily reverted back into good old fashioned sign language. She simply stood up and pointed towards the staircase. Melinda nodded, having understood what Lily was getting at now. She was probably just relieved to have nobody watching over her next moves.


	3. After

Lily rushed down the stairs after this, because she didn't want to loose track of everybody once she knew where they were. She had to push her way through the throngs of people on the dance floor to get to them. This had been a much easier task earlier in the night. It seemed that as people got drunker, they began to be more reluctant to step back to let somebody through.

Something else Lily found on this venture through the people that she had not had to deal with before was the random groping. As she walked through the crowd, random hands shot out and latched onto her wrist, her hip, anything really that they could get their hand on. Lily was tired of it and so she just kept unclawing their fingers and throwing them off of her body. These happened a good half-a-dozen times in the short distance between the edge of the dance floor and the centre.

When Lily met up with everybody she couldn't help but notice that Ty was in an even worse state than he had been in when she had left not to long ago. Danny was in full-blown supervisor mode, watching over everybody and making sure everyone was doing okay.

Her hips began to sway along to the beat as her tired yet stimulated body absorbed what was going on around her. Now that the excitement of the last little bit was beginning to simmer down she was really beginning to feel the hour. A glance at her watch told her that it was after one in the morning. She couldn't quite remember when last call was. Was it two, or was it three o'clock? She had never thought she'd stay until then, but it was beginning to look like she would be having little choice. As long as Melinda was off with the guy, Lily had nowhere to go to, to spend the night. Sure she could make her way home to her parent's place, but she wasn't to keen on the idea of that. Only as a last resort. Her parent's were home, and thought Lily was off to an innocent sleepover. Melinda's parents were away on holiday so there they had the place to themselves. As long as Lily was not with Melinda though, the odds were greatly increased that they wouldn't wind up where they had planned to spend the night.

As everybody around her danced, Lily kept looking up towards the balcony. For a brief few minutes she thought she saw Melinda leaning up against the railing, peering out across the crowd. However, the next time she looked, nobody was there.

After about half an hour of not seeing Melinda, Lily realized it was time to go look for her and drag her friend away regardless of what she was doing. After all, the way the buses worked at this hour, their travel time home would be much longer than the time it took to get to where they were. They could always call a cab, but it was still a long drive, and Lily didn't feel all that eager to shell out money for that as long as she knew she could safely get back on the bus. As a last resort however, she would not be opposed to calling for a ride.

Again Lily detached herself from their little mob and pushed her way back through the dancers. Just like before, hands shot out to touch her and she batted them away in disgust. The first place she went to look for Melinda was upstairs on the couches, but surprisingly enough they were actually empty and Melinda was nowhere to be seen. A slight wave of panic set in at this point as Lily briefly wondered if she had done the wrong thing by leaving Melinda with a strange guy. The thing was, even then she had known it was wrong, but she had just been trying to ease her discomfort of feeling like a third wheel.

When Lily made a complete trip around the main floor of the club and still didn't find Melinda, panic really began to set it. Again her brain was going into overdrive as she weighed out all sorts of situations. She decided to think logically and took another spin through the bar area. Due to the number of people, it would have been incredibly easy for her to simply miss seeing Melinda. At least that's what she told herself. When this search turned up nothing, Lily decided she had to head back, and call in the reinforcements. So that was what she was doing when she stumbled across Melinda on the dance floor, or who she thought was Melinda. It was hard to tell from behind, and there was no way she could see her face, considering her lips were smashed up against those of a guy. While everybody around them was shaking to the music, Melinda's entire body was pressed up against a guy as they snogged, completely oblivious to everybody around them.

Lily decided it would be a bit rude to go over and tap Melinda on the shoulder, so she hung back and vowed to just keep an eye on her friend. From where Ty was bouncing around with his buddies around him, Lily knew she could still see the couple snogging, so she headed back over to her dancing group to wait out Melinda's snog.

Eventually Melinda broke away from her guy. He quickly scampered away and Melinda started to look around in search of her friends. Apparently she was still in a bit of a daze from having her tonsils viciously batted at for so long, because she looked directly at Lily and then kept turning in a circle looking for anybody she knew. Lily took this as her queue to approach Melinda, which she did. Due to it being to loud to announce her presence to her friend who was staring off in the other direction, Lily placed her hand gently on her taller friend's shoulder. Melinda jumped slightly and spun around, all in one very fluid move.

"It's you!" Melinda said, but Lily didn't hear either of the words. She was lucky enough however to be able to clearly read Melinda's lips.

Lily grabbed her friends arm and dragged her a little ways away from the heart of the dance floor. Once the noise level had decreased ever so slightly, Lily turned and yelled into Melinda's ear, "I'm ready to go, if that's okay."

"Sure, we should tell them we're going though," Melinda motioned back to the dance floor, where somewhere in the broad area the group that they had come with was still dancing away.

Melinda led the way this time through the people, and Lily hung back when she went in to say good bye to everyone. After they cleared everything up, they made tracks for the exit.

Side by side they pushed out through the double doors and into the cool night air. Fall was definitely approaching. Lily never knew whether to be sad or happy when September finally wound around. She loved the summer, more than anything. She was the type of person that loved the heat and it could never be too hot for her. Not that the temperature really got that high to begin with in England though. Then the first of September came and Lily would have to leave one of her ways of life for the complete opposite. She'd leave a world of technology and family for one of history and friends. Don't get her wrong, she loved Hogwarts. Actually she loved everything about it, well except for one or two key individuals but that was besides the point, and Hogwarts truly was her home. It was hard to deny your attachment to something when you would spend the better part of seven years there, day in and day out. That being said, as Lily walked down the muggle entertainment district street with her best friend beside her, she knew she would have a much harder time going back this year versus all the other years, because she'd had a taste of freedom and carefreeness. Two things that she could never have at Hogwarts. At Hogwarts she was the goody-two-shoes, bookworm who was destined to make Head Girl. The girl now walking down the street at 2 am, didn't feel like any of those things. She felt different now, changed. She was no longer a little girl. It definitely was not going to be easy.

It turned out that the girls lucked in and walked around the corner to where they suspected the nearest bus stop was, and sure enough, there it was. There were huge crowds mingling around, waiting for the bus to arrive. As soon as Melinda and Lily cross the street the bus pulled up. It was almost magical how well they had timed it. Everybody who had been standing on the sidewalk piled onto the bus, even though there technically wasn't enough room for everybody, but it was late and everyone just wanted to get home quickly and safely so nobody fussed.

The actual ride took less time than Lily had originally predicted it would, but it was still over an hour for the complete journey home. As Melinda tenderly unlocked her front door, the full extend of Lily's exhaustion finally set in. Neither girl had said a whole lot of anything on the bus ride. It was apparent that they both were lost deep in their own thoughts, and were too spent to waste any energy by speaking.

"I'm going to shower in the morning," Melinda said, "I'm just way too tired to do it now."

As much as this sounded like a good plan to Lily, she knew that it would probably be best if she didn't wait till morning. She felt incredibly sticky from all the sweat, and to top it off she just felt really grimy. Partly because of all the guys that had pressed themselves up against her. It wasn't so much a dirty-in the literal sense of the word-feeling that she had to wash away, but a disgust that she felt tainted. Alas, exhaustion won out and instead of crawling into the tub, Lily crawled under the covers. All the mental and physical dirt still caked upon her. She'd deal with it in the morning.

Once Melinda shut the lights out however, Lily instantly felt slightly renewed. In the dark, she was able to think and finally process everything that had happened. If she was to be honest, she was still quite turned on, but there was nothing she could do about that right now with Melinda laying in the same room. Sadly enough. If she couldn't physically relieve some of her build up, she at least would have liked to talk about it. As she was lying there on her pile of cushions she felt her body become all jittery with excitement. She felt like she would explode if she didn't gush about what had happened. Even though Melinda had witnessed the whole thing. Luckily enough for her, Melinda rolled over in her bed and said, "So…"

"So what?" Lily wasn't going to just come out with anything however, she would need a bit of coaxing, even though she was just about at her boiling point.

"So, you know."

"Did you know your guy at all? Was he one of the many people in our group that I didn't notice?"

Melinda let out a loud laugh, "No, I just scoped him out and went for it. It works you see. But I don't really need to be telling you that, because you weren't doing to shabby yourself."

While Melinda was probably Lily's best muggle friend, there were still some things she didn't know about Lily's most personal secrets. Melinda did know that Lily had not very much experience with guys, she just did not know the complete extend to which this went and Lily had never clarified. Therefore, Melinda would not have assumed that Lily had just had her first kiss, and Lily wasn't really going to change that.

"No, he wasn't too bad," Lily chuckled. Even though she did catch a few glimpses of him, she could honestly say that if she was forced to pick him out of crowd, she would only have luck to assist her in the challenge. The quick glimpses however were enough for her to tell that he was on the good end of the spectrum as far as looks went.

"You know he went to a strip club after her left you?" Melinda said.

Lily's thoughts and emotions started to spiral at the mention of this. Was she that bad that he had figured he should bail out on the dance clubs and move on to watch almost naked girls dancing? It hurt Lily, even though she knew that it was no strings attached and that meant no emotions involved. He had been her first kiss though, so maybe that did warrant a little emotion even though it was no strings attached. The thought that he had bailed so abruptly to a strip club still made Lily's stomach twist uncomfortably. What had she done wrong? Lily didn't like making mistakes, but if she had to make them at least she could learn something from it so she never made the mistake again.

As Lily drifted off to sleep and idea struck her. It was a scenario that she much preferred to allow herself to believe. Maybe he had bolted off to a strip club not because he felt like he was wasting his time with her, which in all honesty he was. He had somehow managed to pick the one girl in the entire club who was not willing to sleep with him. But he could have gone off to relieve some of the tension she had built up in him. He could have been thinking that she was a tease. After she had so willingly allowed him to snog her, but then abruptly stopped his hand from creeping around. Yes, that was the scenario that Lily would keep telling herself. She liked it much better than what she had originally assumed because it portrayed her as somebody that could really get a guy going, and it showed that she had turned him on enough to disappoint him.

It wasn't likely that this scenario was true, but she could at least think it to be so. That way it would alleviate some of the tension in her gut. With that last thought, Lily quickly dropped off to sleep. A sleep which she had kind of hoped would be filled with dreams, because considering the high she was currently on, the dreams could only turn out to be stellar representations of what had happened. Maybe she could even dream a different ending to her night. One in which she ended up not sleeping alone.

The thing about dreams were that they were safe. You didn't have to worry about being drugged or kidnapped or even hurt by a guy in your dream. Everything always would turn out well and so while Lily was really a prude and incredibly innocent in her actions in real life, she was quite the opposite when scenarios developed in her mind. In her mind she would partake in just about anything with a guy. The realities of life held her back from actually doing these things though.

Unfortunately for Lily, when the light of morning woke her up she came to the sad realization that she had been so exhausted that she hadn't dreamt at all. To top of this now sour atmosphere that was befalling Lily, she looked at her watch and noticed the time. By the time they had got back to Melinda's place and actually climbed into bed it well pretty much 3am. The worst thing about looking at her watch for Lily was realizing that it was now only five hours later and she was wide awake, and apparently so was Melinda.

"Morning," Melinda wearily said.

"Morning," Lily replied as she tried to grind away the sleep that had formed in the crooks of her eyes.

As it would turn out, neither girl was actually all that wide awake, because two hours later they both opened their eyes again after another couple of blissful hours of sleep.

Neither girl proceeded to move very quickly after this. While Lily did not feel any effects of the night before except exhaustion coupled with both a mental high and low, Melinda on the other hand was experiencing a budding hangover.

Both girls took their turns washing up and eating breakfast and then Lily gathered her stuff. It was nearing the point where she had to say goodbye to Melinda for another year. Her parents would be there soon to collect her. In twenty-four hours she would be chugging north on a historic train to once again become a different person.

Melinda and Lily bade farewell to each other as Lily's parents watched over them. Then it was homeward bound. Once at home Lily had some last minute packing to do and then it was down to the final stretch.

Over the years the Evans' Household had perfected a routine for sending Lily off. Now it was more like tradition, it had been done so many times. Lily couldn't help but think what would they do when she finished her seventh year and moved out on her own? Then she'd be a fully qualified and trained witch, but where would she choose to set down her roots? It had always been easy before. She was a witch from September to June and then for the summer months she was a muggle. In less than two years, Lily would have to decide which part of herself would win out as she sought to carve her way in the world. Wherever it may happen to be.

She could worry about all this later. Right now she had to have the traditional spaghetti dinner that would then lead into a family outing to the old fashioned ice-cream parlour that was just around the corner from their house. There Lily would order one scoop of vanilla on top of one scoop of chocolate with hot fudge sauce and whipped cream. Yes, they did include the cherry on top.

After this it was a movie and then off to bed, for they had an early start to the day. Lily was almost counting down the seconds until she'd be back at Hogwarts and be able to slip back into her routine. The key thing being it was her routine. Not one that was moulded around what everyone else wanted to do, like it was at home. That definitely was one thing that took getting used to when she arrived back home for break. At Hogwarts there was no family judging and controlling your every move and there were no family rules. Sure there were school rules at Hogwarts, but they weren't as bothersome as those at home. They were more like laws. The average person at Hogwarts didn't break the rules, because the average person was not a bad individual. At home however, the rules were as minor as making sure your boots were lined up properly in the hall closet. Oddly enough, that rule was something that really ticked Lily off at home, but if her mother were to see her space in the dorm at Hogwarts, she would see that Lily was actually an incredible neat freak.

Morning came and brought with it a dreary day. It was befitting of Lily's mood as she said her goodbyes to her parent's. Petunia had opted not to accompany them to the station. It was no secret that she felt incredibly uncomfortable around all the magical folk on the platform. Even though Lily didn't get along with her sister, she had still been pleased that she had, even reluctantly, still partaken in the family tradition the night before. it had meant a lot to the youngest daughter.

On the train, Lily strolled through the carriages until she found the one occupied by her friends. She was mostly quite throughout the journey. Instead of talking she preferred to listen to what everybody had to say about their wonderful adventures over the holidays. The whole time Lily was listening, she was also thinking. She knew she wanted to talk to somebody. She had to spread her news. If she kept it bottled up inside much longer she was going to explode and that would by no means be a pretty picture. There was absolutely no way she was going to come out with it right there however, it was just too awkward. Thus she decided to wait until they all got settled into their dorms for the night. Then she'd snag her friend to talk.

The feast dragged on, even though the Headmaster's speech at the beginning was rather interesting and unique, and the hat's song took an interesting spin from where it had been the previous year. All in all, the food was good and the company was reminiscent of old times. All was good.

Up in the Gryffindor Girl's Dormitory everyone hastily crawled into bed after a long day. Lily knew that if she wanted to talk, she wouldn't have to alert her friend. She'd just know. Sure enough after all the lights were out and the bed curtains were drawn, Lily's suddenly parted as somebody crawled in. Lily had her wand tucked under the bedsheets and as the curtains slipped back into their original position, Lily muttered a charm that would ward off anybody from listening in on their conversation.

"Sixth year and still going strong."

"That's for sure Kelsey," Lily chuckled.

What Kelsey had been referring to was that on the first day back at Hogwarts they always had this little informal gathering. It had originally started in first year because Kelsey, the youngest of all her siblings had been sorted into a different house. While all her relatives as far back as she could trace had been in Ravenclaw, the hat had put her into Gryffindor. Kelsey had been so upset that she had had to be comforted by Lily well into the night. They'd kept up the ritual of Kelsey coming over to visit ever since.

"So how was your summer my girl? I didn't get many owls from you."

"My summer was okay, but it was this past weekend that really makes a good story."

"Oh," even though it was dark, it was evident just from the tone of Kelsey's voice that she had raised her one eyebrow. She wanted more. Lily had just baited the hook and the fish were now frolicking to bite at it. But this fish in particular was smart and she wasn't just going to make a clean bite. Instead she was going to tease just a little. She could make it fun. She knew that Lily had something big to spill, but their conversation would quickly fizzle and die if they got right to the juicy bits first.

"So I pretty much just did the family thing you know. We did the whole summer vacation thing to the continent and yeah. Not much to say about that," Kelsey droned on, just trying to keep the subject away from where it was ultimately going to go, "What was the general gist of your summer?"

"Lonesome," Lily murmured. While she had always felt lonely when all of her friends had boyfriends and she didn't, she especially felt it now that she could put it all into perspective. To top it off, she also had to deal with her parents leaving every morning for work, and her sister hating her. Which was then followed by her trying to avoid Lily and sneak out of the house whenever she was around. All in all, Lily spent the majority of her summer reading, baking or even playing cards. It really was a sad existence she found herself in.

"Well, that's rather depressing," Kelsey said, "but what was good about it?"

"This last weekend."

"What made it so great?"

"I went out with some muggles. A friend of mine and her university friends that were all guys."

Kelsey let out a long, slow whistle. If she had have been talking to anybody else she would have predicted that this was going to be the good part of the story. With Lily however, she figured it was just a lead up to something that she had done the next day that had no relevance to seemingly hot older guys. Kelsey still could be shocked though, and she was about to.

"And how was that?" Kelsey played along but she was slightly bored. They obviously were no where near the meat of the story yet.

"So, so much fun," Lily beamed as she thought back to her night. All the emotions she had felt and couldn't wait to experience again. While she did just want to come out with what she had done, she felt like spitting it out would be too abrupt so she held off. She wanted Kelsey to ask for it.

"That's nice," Kelsey was not going to play nicely though, "you went with Melanie?"

"No, Melinda," Lily corrected, "I felt kind of bad, we made it pretty awkward for her."

The pronoun _we _had just slipped in before Lily realized what she was actually saying. Lily had no doubt that Kelsey had picked up on it as well.

"She found this guy and we were hanging out in the lounge area of this club."

"But it was a good time."

Lily felt like screaming, or just spitting it out, but she simply couldn't.

"Yeah, this guys friend and I…well we were sitting across from them and…we made it pretty awkward for Melinda and her guy."

Lily was trying to say without using the exact words that they had started to snog while their friends watched on. Maybe Kelsey wasn't getting that though Lily thought. It was quite possible she was taking it the exact opposite way and thinking that Lily had watched on while her muggle friend had snogged.

"I see, well when we were travelling…" Kelsey knew how to play Lily and so she changed the subject to make Lily think that she had no interest in the chase anymore and was just giving up. This she knew would upset and fluster Lily and cause her to spit out whatever was on her mind.

It worked, because before Kelsey could get her whole sentence out, Lily was rambling away about some guy she met and snogged on a dark area of a club.

"Okay, okay. There was this guy and well we may or may not have snogged."

There it was. Success!

"Oh really," Kelsey feigned disinterest.

"It was dark and, it wasn't just any small little kiss."

"Who was he?" Kelsey asked the fully loaded, million dollar question.

"Just somebody. Some random guy."

"What was his name?"

"I think…" Lily hesitated as she quickly played back their introductions in her head. The music had been pounding and so had her head. She had thought she had heard him correctly, but maybe she hadn't.

"Now that's a good phrase to be linked to the name of the first guy you've ever kissed," she snorted rather sarcastically.

"Well, I think his name was James."

Kelsey wasn't laughing anymore. The seconds ticked by without either girl making a sound. Lily shifted uncomfortably on the mattress. Apparently Kelsey had just made the connection in her mind that Lily was trying not to think about.

"Seriously?" Kelsey broke the silence with a single loaded word.

"I guess."

"Now that's kind of ironic if you ask me," Kelsey snorted, "what did he look like?"

"No! I know what you're thinking and it's not true."

"Okay, so what did he look like?"

"I told you it was dark."

"So you don't know his name or what he looks like…"

"I know where he goes to school Kelsey, and the area where he lives. He's a muggle."

"It's just quite a coincidence. I mean, I could see Potter pulling that sort of stunt. Can't you?"

"It wasn't Potter."

"How do you know?"

"I just do okay."

"That's not good enough."

"Fine, you really want to know how I know?"

Kelsey let out a long sigh as if she was trying to control her impatiences, "Obviously, or I wouldn't have been asking you for the last five bloody minutes. Now spit it out, or I may have to brush up on some of my handy little jinxes I haven't used since spring time. I mean, I know I'm good with a wand, but they're definitely tricky little things to master. You and I both know that if they aren't done perfectly, it could become quite troublesome, if not impossible to fully reverse the effects."

Lily knew that Kelsey was taking this opportunity to stare her down and try to intimidate her into talking.

"Five…four…"

"I wouldn't have been so turned on while it was happening if it had have been James Potter."

"That's very subjective you know, and doesn't truly explain anything," Kelsey lowered her voice, even though there was no threat that anybody could hear anything they were saying, "I might have actually believed that if you had said it exactly opposite. You knew it wasn't him because you weren't turned on by the snog. Face it. You know, that I know how gaga you are over him. You just don't want to come out with it because of fear. Fear for your reputation, your pride and oh, your reputation. But hey, this really doesn't involve me. I'm not missing out on anything. Now what was that you were saying about two friends getting with two friends?" she changed the subject for which Lily was thankful for. Before she had done so however, Lily had not missed the advice her overbearing friend was trying to give.

Lily nodded.

"But there was no, you know, mixing between these couplings?"

Lily chuckled but it was only out of embarrassment, "No!"

"Still, pretty kinky if you ask me?"

"Sure, maybe it sounds like it was, but in reality it wasn't."

"Sure…" Kelsey dragged out the word to show Lily that she really didn't believe her, "but anyways. Welcome to the club. Did anybody ever tell you, you'll never forget your first kiss?"

"I think I heard it somewhere before," Lily chuckled inwardly to herself.

"Just be thankful that you can actually remember it and that it was memorable."

"It really was," Lily mused, "it really was," she trailed off into a cloud of nostalgia.

It was exactly why the girls got along like they did. Months could go by without either seeing each other face to face, and when they were reunited it was like nothing had changed. Even if Lily didn't have a guy in her life she could at least savour some of the things she did have. Good friends being one, and good memories, another. Because until Lily found it in herself to approach a guy, all she would have was the memory of her first kiss and what led up to it. No wonder nobody forgot their first kiss. There was nothing about it that was forgettable. From the first touch of lip on lip, to the ever-roaming hands. Every sensation, every touch, every emotion was permanently ingrained in a person's mind. Something that Lily was grateful for, because she never wanted to forget the feeling, and luckily enough for her she wouldn't. Because nobody forgets their first kiss.

a/n Whew…I've been working on this for weeks. What I first intended to be about 3-5 thousand words ended up at close to 23K. It was supposed to be a one shot, then it evolved into a three-chappie story just to break it up a bit. I still wrote it as one continuous chapter though so if at any point you felt like the chapter ended abruptly, well it was just because I chopped it into three the best I could after the fact.

While I had originally started to write this to post on fanfic, once I got part ways in I began to reconsider this decision. This story took on a more personal edge for me and for a while I felt like it was something i wasn't going to share. I put all this work into it though and even as I'm typing this I know I'm going to post it, but I'm reluctant to do so. Therefore I only ask that you in return for me actually posting this, you take a few minutes to review it. Thank you.


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